Teenage girls commit suicide in Mankhurd, Kandivali

Two minors committed suicide in different parts of the city this week. While a 17-year-old girl jumped off a highrise in Kandivali, a 13-year-old from Mankhurd chose to end her life after being scolded by her parents over a petty domestic issue. Police have registered accidental death reports in both the cases.

The Kandivali teenager, a student of class 10 in a nearby school, jumped off a 17th-floor flat of an 18-floor Lokhandwala complex building in Kandivali East on Tuesday evening. As per officials from Samata Nagar police, the incident took place around 4.30 pm, right after the girl returned from school.

According to neighbours, the girl’s family consisted of her parents, and four elder siblings – three sisters and a brother. “The family had moved to this building only a year ago. Following the move-in, she also had to change her school.

She was upset that after class 10, she would have to change her current school as well,” said one neighbour. He added that the girl was scared about losing the friends she had made in school. The police said that the family had initially told them that the girl may have accidentally fallen off the building as they could not believe she could take such a step. They had still not given their statement to the police by Thursday evening. “We have not found any note in the girl’s belongings. We will carry out further investigation and wait for the post mortem report before arriving at a conclusion,” said the officer.

In the Mankhurd suicide case, the teenage girl lived in a chawl. According to the police, she as well as other family members had to fetch buckets full of water from the community tap to their first-floor house every day. While carrying a bucket of water upstairs on Monday evening, the girl spilled some of the water.

“As the family members were sitting to have dinner, the mother scolded her for being careless and spilling the water. She was told that the spillage could cause someone to trip and injure themselves,” said a police officer. He said that the girl did not take being scolded in front of all family members too well.

After mopping the floor clean of the spilled water, the girl went downstairs, unnoticed by her family members. Half an hour later, they found her hanging by a rope on the ground floor of their building. “The family rushed the girl to a nearby government hospital in Govandi where she was declared dead on arrival. Her post mortem report confirms ‘death due to hanging’,” informed ACP Shrikant Desai of Trombay division.